Lexus sends a test drive invite into space in Men In Black campaign via M&C Saatchi Melbourne
M&C Saatchi Melbourne has created a campaign to showcase Lexus’ involvement in the upcoming Sony Entertainment film Men In Black: International.
In cinemas from June 13, the alien blockbuster, starring Australia’s own Chris Hemsworth, features the new Lexus RC F high-performance coupe and to extend the partnership, M&C Saatchi came up with the idea to send a test drive invitation into space.
Through an exclusive partnership with Swinburne University’s Centre for Astrophysics, the sound of the vehicle’s 5.0-litre V8 was encoded into an audio waveform that was transmitted to deep space with the open invitation: “New Lexus RC F. Earth. We’ve been expecting you.”
The campaign, which will be seeded via social media and Lexus’ owned assets, goes behind the scenes of the project from the Calder Park racetrack where the V8 engine was recorded to Swinburne where professor Matthew Bailes and his team encoded the message, concluding at the Molonglo Observatory Synthesis Telescope near Canberra as the transmission was beamed towards Orion’s Belt – a reference to the original Men In Black film starring Will Smith and Tommy Lee Jones.
Says Vin Naidoo, marketing director, Lexus: “Lexus is proud to anticipate the needs of its customers before they’ve communicated them and we are excited to take that philosophy beyond earth to new worlds with this innovative partnership.”
Says Emma Robins, executive creative director, M&C Saatchi Melbourne: “We’ve all worked on a lot of campaigns in our careers which talk to different target markets but aliens is definitely a first. Lexus has been all in on this RC F project. We’re excited the invitation is now in space. Even more so about what we might hear back.”
Agency: M&C Saatchi Melbourne
CCO: Cam Blackley
ECD: Emma Robbins
CD: Russel Fox
Head of Integrated Production: Gene Kingi
Creative Team: Daniel Borghesi, Thomas White, Mathew Hine
Designers: Jessica Ramsey, Richard Sellies
Client Service Director: Callum Walker
Senior Account Director: Symon van Haalen
Senior TV Producer: Julie Rutherford
Strategist: Ryan Smith
Marketing Director: Vin Naidoo
Marketing Manager: James Curtis
Manager, Marketing Operations: Tracey Schouten
Advertising Coordinator: David Di Lisio
Senior Media Planning Coordinator: James Huynh
Production
Agency: Betty Wants In
Director: Max Greenstein
DOP: Chas Mackinnon
Executive Producer: Andrew Dunlop
7 Comments
“We had to find a solution that was both technically feasible, adhered to radio transmission regulations and didn’t blow up our telescope. In a few thousand years we’ll find out if anyone has heard it.”
Sweet. Can’t wait!
what a waste of time, money, resources and time.
Think what you could have done with this budget? Such a first thought.
Also didn’t Tesla send a car into space? If I was an alien in the market for a new car I’d probably test drive the one that’s floating past me rather than the radio ad I can’t even understand
Of all the car demonstration ideas with a group of techy looking people working together to figure out how to do it – this is at least better than that Alfa Romeo Opera singer one.
Very cool
Big congrats to all involved in this petulant waste of a client’s budget. This deserves to be the 2019’s updated version of ‘Truth In Advertising’.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d83BsgQQMP8
I don’t think this comes across first-thought at all @TNILH – the notion of digitising the sound of a Lexus roaring and blasting it into space seems like quite an abstract way of answering a brief that was about promoting Lexus’ involvement in a MIB movie to me. And to get the guys at Swinburne and the observatory on board – no small effort there either.
Nice work M&C, it’s awesome.
Spectacularly pointless.